


Maybe The Sea

by stereomer



Category: Panic At The Disco
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-23
Updated: 2012-03-23
Packaged: 2017-11-02 09:32:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/367538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stereomer/pseuds/stereomer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story about magical realism, fairy tales, and a sleepy town by the sea.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maybe The Sea

The sun is barely hanging higher than any of the shortest trees; Ryan estimates that it’s just past seven in the morning. He winds his way through the town, taking the long way around the back of the bakery – and it  _must_  be seven in the morning, judging by the smell of freshly baked bread – and the drug store and the fabric shop, where he discovers a maroon swatch of dusty muslin caught beneath the door. It’s too small and thin to be important, but still, it's a rare find, and he spends a few minutes simply examining it and looking around to see if anyone’s come searching.  
  
No one comes. He hangs around a bit more before deeming it safe. A few nudges of his foot lodges the swatch free and then he’s off again, this time with the fabric securely between his fingers, the long end trailing behind him as he ambles along the roads.   
  
“There goes the paperboy,” he hears someone say, and he squints into the distance. It’s Mrs. Bruno, from what he can see of the heavy curve of stomach and the lack of neck, standing next to her husband with the handle of a broom running through both hands. “It’s no wonder this town never gets caught up on the news.”  
  
Ryan shifts his shoulder bag, still full of rolled up newspapers that are smudging ink everywhere, and shuffles even more slowly. Despite their proximity to the ocean, the early summer heat is already beginning to weave through the town, pushing out the last of the cool air from the night before. Ryan doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to the summers here but a little heat is no reason to forgo sartorial dignity, he thinks.   
  
He stops right in the middle of the square and pulls the length of the maroon fabric through his hands until his fists are clutching the ends. The edges are messy with loose threads and dust is caulked into the grooves, but the latter lifts away easily enough as Ryan yanks the ends until the fabric becomes taut, again and again. Then he carefully wraps it around his neck; it’s long enough to make a few loops that cover up most of the unhemmed edges, and he tucks the ends underneath the collar of his shirt.   
  
The air is noticeably warmer by the time he finishes patting everything down. When he looks up, there’s a boy standing not far away, watching him curiously. Ryan stares back with his hands loose at his sides. The boy is Frank Iero, who lives up in the big house on the hill. Strangely, his own hands are covered with white powder and there’s some on his nose, too.   
  
When a white palm comes up and waves at Ryan, Ryan pauses, then waves back.   
  
  


*

  
He doesn’t see Frank for a while after that. Maybe he catches glimpses of him through the windows of the bakery or sees him running along the sand, kicking up handfuls of it with his bare feet, but never for more than a few seconds. Ryan’s too busy listening to the townspeople to seek Frank out, because like every summer, the area is becoming rife with rumors of sea creatures and a boy who lives among them, but like every summer, Ryan’s mother tells him they’re just old legends being resurrected in the lazy heat when no one has energy to do anything else.   
  
“I heard there  _is_  a boy,” says Brendon. He’s chewing on a piece of wheat yanked from somewhere up in the hills. His breeches are filthy and his face is streaked with dirt, but there are brilliant white flashes of teeth when he speaks and his eyes are always bright. Ryan likes him.   
  
“Just rumors,” Ryan tells him, swinging his ankles against the dock. He looks over the edge and his reflection gazes back at him before he sits up again and stares out into the horizon.   
  
“It isn’t,” Brendon counters. “Don’t you hear splashes at night, sometimes? If you’re awake at the right moment? They’re not dolphins, I can tell.”  
  
Ryan sticks the pad of his index finger into a dip on one of the wooden slats. “Maybe.” Truth is, he might have even seen the splashes a couple nights ago. He might have even seen Frank Iero running along the sand, moonlight reflecting off his wet hair.   
  
Maybe.   
  
Brendon says, “Jonathan says it’s true.” Jonathan is the son of the card-reading madam who lives on the outskirts of the town. Ryan has no idea how Brendon manages to befriend even the oddest of people.   
  
“Jonathan also says you were born from a falling star that hit the ground by the Gallos’ vegetable patch.”  
  
“That’s because I was.” Brendon grins, then shoves the wet, frayed end of the wheat stalk against Ryan’s cheek.   
  
  


*

  
By mid-summer, Ryan has saved enough money to buy -  _really_  buy, like an honest boy - several more swatches of cloth from the Smiths’ fabric shop. Mrs. Smith puts her hands on her hips and says things like, “How you’re saving money when no one in town gets more than two newspapers a week, I’ll never know,” and, “Good god, boy,” before shoving a pastry into his hands. Then she always gives one coin back before ushering him out.   
  
Back in his room, he’s laid out the scarves in neat lines of royal blue, poppy red, seafoam green, ivory white, gunmetal black, and dark maroon. The last one is worn soft with use. Sometimes he sleeps with it curled in his hands, listening to the ocean outside his open window.   
  
  


*

  
One night, he dreams that he hears voices and splashing, along with some shouts of laughter or cries of pain, he doesn’t know.    
  
When he wakes up, there’s still a trace of fog covering the water and his mind feels the same way, not yet able to differentiate between dreams and waking life. He sits up, sees an empty space between the rows of scarves, and blinks. The space stays empty. He crawls to the foot of the bed and discovers that the maroon one is indeed missing, replaced by several shiny coins.    
  
A gull caws in the distance, and Ryan slowly turns to look over his shoulder at the open window.    
  
  


*

  
“Mother says she’s out of the dark maroon,” Spencer Smith says. He’s wearing an apron for reasons Ryan can’t fathom, since fabrics didn’t spit up on you or smear mud onto your clothing. “She says she’s looked in the back room and everything.”   
  
“Hmm.” Ryan drums his fingers on the counter, accidentally hitting a roll of measuring tape with his pinky. “You’re sure?”   
  
“She just went out to pick up some flank steak from the Butcher,” Spencer says. “But she’ll be back soon, and you can ask her yourself then.”   
  
“No matter,” Ryan says. Spencer is round-faced and standing still most of the time when Ryan sees him, but still, Ryan doesn’t want to get on his bad side. “Thanks for the message.”   
  
“Welcome. Next time, maybe. When the bolts get replaced.”    
  
“Maybe.” Ryan nods a goodbye and turns to walk out the door, back into the stifling heat. It’s hot inside the shop too, but at least there’s refuge from the sun.    
  
Spencer says, “Hey.”   
  
Ryan turns around again.   
  
“A dark maroon scarf, right?”   
  
“Yes.”   
  
“That Iero boy’s taken to wearing scarves these days. He works at the bakery in the mornings, before anyone’s awake.” Spencer shrugs. Ryan takes a moment to admire how Spencer calls Frank Iero ‘that Iero boy’, when Frank is sure to be at least a few years older than the both of them. “If you ask me, it’s too hot to be wearing anything at all, but then I’d be thrown into the town jail for indecency.”   
  
Ryan grins. “And that in and of itself would be a crime.”   
  
Spencer smiles back. Ryan decides he likes him too. “Thanks,” he says again, and steps out of the shop.   
  
  


* 

  
“It’s too early,” Brendon declares. “For anything.” But he throws a newspaper into the Brunos’ garden, hitting the tomatoes. “Why are we helping you again?”   
  
“Because none of you have anything better to do until midday,” says Ryan.    
  
“Lies,” Brendon says.    
  
“I’ll admit it’s the truth,” Spencer says before digging a newspaper out of Ryan’s bag and tossing it over the wooden fence at the De Luca house.    
  
“Yes, be a man about it please, Brendon.” Jonathan Walker has apparently caught up to them, judging by the volume of his voice and the distinct smell of herbs.    
  
Brendon scoffs. “We’ve got years and years until we’re men. I say we make the most of that time.” He punctuates this statement by throwing a paper high into a tree, where it gets lodged amongst the branches.    
  
“Wonderful,” says Ryan.    
  
They wander through the town listlessly, collars sagging with sweat and toes uncomfortably squished up against the tips of their shoes. Still, they make a valiant effort to wreak a quiet kind of havoc by kicking rocks at each other and opening closed mailboxes and closing the opened ones as they pass by. Spencer walks alongside Ryan while Brendon dances to the side before returning every ten steps or so; Jonathan lags behind, rubbing leaves with his fingers and squinting up into the sky.    
  
“Hey,” Brendon says abruptly. “He’s wearing a scarf, too. So there are two people in this town who’ve lost their mind.”   
  
Ryan sees Frank Iero coming up the road, the one that leads back from the beach. He’s got Ryan’s dark maroon scarf tied around his neck, clumsily looped and tucked so that it’s loosening into oblong shapes with each step. Frank looks up at the sight of four shadows darkening the dirt road. His eyes meet Ryan’s for a moment, and Ryan sees his hand twitch up toward his neck before he regains control and shoves it into the pocket of his breeches.    
  
“Hello,” Brendon calls.    
  
“Hello,” Frank calls back. He has a nice voice, deeper than all four of theirs. He veers off the path and starts cutting through the grass in a more direct line to his house.    
  
“He’s seen the sea creatures,” says Jonathan in a casual voice.    
  
“Those are just rumors,” Spencer says boredly, but he looks out into the ocean all the same.   
  
“Are not,” Brendon disagrees.   
  
Ryan is wearing his seafoam green scarf today. He tugs it down under his chin and says, “Spencer, I believe we are the only two logical people here.”   
  
“You’re just pretending you don’t believe it,” says Brendon. “But it’s all right, I know what you really think.” He nudges his elbow against Ryan’s, and Ryan stays quiet for a while. He watches the maroon scarf bobbing away in the distance and finally says, “Maybe.”   
  
  


*

  
Ryan has been waking up earlier and earlier to deliver papers before the sun bears down on the town without mercy. It’s still grey out today, all colors translated into shades of black or white, and he stumbles a few times on his way out of the house. He decides to let Brendon, Spencer, and Jonathan sleep through the route, and takes the long way around by himself for the first time in a few weeks.   
  
Surprisingly, the lamp in the bakery is lit and the smell of bread makes Ryan’s stomach grumble. It’s understandable that the Toros would also want to get started early, considering the fact that the fire ovens must magnify the summer heat at least ten-fold, but Ryan hasn’t ever seen them  _this_  early.   
  
He cuts around to the back, near the spot where he’d found the first scrap of cloth all those months ago, and sees Frank Iero with the very same fabric again. This time it’s hanging unwound, only curled over the back of his neck. Ryan thinks he sees something else too, but no, it must only be a trick of the shadows, a shift of light that comes with the pre-dawn.  
  
With a sudden movement, Frank whips around and looks directly at Ryan. Ryan sees that it wasn’t a trick of the shadows or a shift of light; he’s got – he’s got –   
  
He’s got  _gills_ .  
  
They open neatly as Frank takes in a sharp breath. There are two on each side of his neck, and it becomes clear to Ryan, all at once.   
  
“I,” Frank says. He tries again: “Please.”  
  
Ryan knows staring is uncouth and rude, but he can’t help it. He doesn’t know how long they stand there, just waiting for the other to react. Before he knows it, the first rays of sunlight are making their way over roofs and through trees.   
  
He finally begins to move closer to Frank, who makes as if to run away, but Ryan simply shakes his head and continues, his pace slow and measured. Frank stands there until Ryan is right in front of him.   
  
“It’s just, it’s been so hot,” Frank tries to explain. From this close, Ryan sees that they’re practically the same height, and that Frank’s hair is pieced together in chunks from the drying seawater. Ryan wants to reach out, touch the gills, ask  _How_ ? Or  _Why_ ?   
  
Instead, he loops the scarf around Frank’s neck, from the base of his jaw down to his collarbones, and twists the ends together in the front before pulling a loose knot and tucking it underneath Frank’s shirt.  
  
“It’s more secure. It hides things better, too,” Ryan finds himself saying.   
  
Frank touches the knot. “Thank you,” he says after a pause, his voice wavering slightly.   
  
“You’re welcome.” Ryan steps to the side and starts on his way again. He hears Frank go back inside the bakery after a while, and it’s only then that he realizes his heart is beating more quickly than he ever remembers.   
  
A soft gust of wind blows the scent of saltwater and sand into the air. Ryan breathes in deep, then cups his hands to the window of the fabric shop and tries to see if Mrs. Smith’s gotten any new bolts in yet. 


End file.
